EASY question in regards to 3 hour schedule

[lilyandmollysmom]

My 4.5 mo old currently has the following schedule (take or give a 1/2 hour):

6 am wake and feed 6 oz bottle
7:30 am nap for 1 1/2 hours
9 am 6-8 oz bottle
10:30 am nap for 1 1/2 hours
12 pm 6-8 oz bottle and rice cereal (new to solids this week)
1:30 pm nap 1 1/2 hours
3 pm 6 oz bottle
4:30 pm catnap for 30 minutes
6 pm 6 oz bottle
7 pm 2-4 more oz's to top off
anywhere from 12:30 and 4:30 is another 6 oz bottle

I have three concerns.
1) She's 4.5 months and still on a 3 hour schedule. Is that a bad thing?
2) I don't want to introduce a dream feed. Is she still a big young to worry about dropping the midnight feed?
3)My whole goal in life ( is to get her and her older sister to take a nap at the same time. Her older sister usually takes a 2 hour nap between 12:30 and 1. Any suggestions on how to get them to nap at the same time? Or should I wait to work on this until my younger daughter is down to two naps. I believe that should be happening pretty soon, right?

Thanks for your advice!

[meltown]

you may want to try to stretch your LO to a 3.5 EASY. this will help int he transition of naps. is your LO waking at the same time every night?  it may be habit.  I'm not sure at this age she would really need the 12:30 feed.  especially because she eats so often during the day.  but if your LO is waking at different times during the day then it is probably a needed thing.

you may want to post on the "now there are two" forum about the nap thing.  there are alot of people there who could help with the matching of routines.  I am going to be going down that route soon myself.

[Grace's Mom]

My lo didn't move to a 4 hour EASY until almost 5 months old and she did it cold turkey in one day.
All lo's are different and move to different things at different times.

If your lo is napping well, which it looks like she is, and is doing well at night I wouldn't worry about it. 
Your routine looks GREAT

2 night feeds are still normal at this age. 
If you haven't been doing the DF I wouldn't worry about starting it up.
Once your first feed of the day starts diminishing, then you'll know it will be time start dropping the 4:30am feed, but until then stick with it!

In regards to getting them to nap at the same time....that's a bit difficult because you want to follow both of their cues.  I wouldn't try to make either one of them nap at a certain time...your youngest one will be constantly changing so even if you got her to sleep at that time now, it will change a few weeks/months down the road.  I would just go with what they each need and I bet on some days you'll get lucky

you are doing a great job.

[Grace's Mom]

It looks like we just posted at the exact same time

[lilyandmollysmom]

Funny enough, the past two days the 6 am wake up feed has been diminishing. So I need to start working on getting her out of the 4:30 feed I guess. Thanks ladies.

[Grace's Mom]

There are a few ways you can do that....

1.  Offer less in her bottle all together

or

2.  Offer the same amount of ounces just have it watered down...for example: if your lo is use to getting 6oz, put 4oz of formula or BM and then 2 extra ounces of water so that you still have 6oz of liquid....you just slowly start to get rid of more and more calories until you are left with just water.